The Ghosts of Wammy's House
by GwendolineChadwick
Summary: Y had returned to Wammy's House with the intentions of becoming a caretaker to the many orphans that resided within, but her ghosts and the ghosts of Wammy's House cannot simply let her rest. There are some stories left untold, and they are determined to not be left behind. Explore Wammy's House and the ghosts that live inside.
1. Chapter 1

CHAPTER ONE

An abnormal number of crows roosted in the oak trees that surrounded Wammy's House, doing very little for the reputation of the place that was often claimed to be cursed if not because of the house's previous occupation as a mental asylum, then surely because of the great misfortune that followed the children around the building like a veil for a bride.

At the time of her moving in, Y thought it a particularly unusual thing, but as she grew older and grew away from the house and its many guests she began to understand that the crows were attracted to the house because it was a place surrounded by death.

The very granite it was built up of, a brilliant grey granite that shone like silver in the rain, was often used for tombstones, coming from a local quarry. The black cast iron gates were designed just as well to keep things in as it was to keep people out, a barrier in its own right against the damned that haunted that place.

She would go forth at night as a guard, making sure the children were not wandering around at unnatural hours with only the slippers on her feet and the torch in her hand, not that she was entirely incapable by herself. Anyone that knew her knew that solely because she was barely above five foot tall did not mean that she was fragile, with years on the streets behind her and many years of hard training making her appear far more sturdy than her attire suggested.

It was a cold November evening and the night had fallen with the fall of five, the night hours stretching out before her like a long, looming shadow that followed her through the dark corridors of the house, the floorboards creaking underneath her as her torch shone in the darkness; a single speck of hope in such emptiness.

She knew the stories well, had heard them told many times by the children. Of strange faces and whispers in the night, of pinched toes and pale figures that stood in the corners of ones vision like specks of dust drifting in the wind; barely comprehending their own solemn existence.

A pity, she would think as she walked through to the East Wing where no living child survived, that they be trapped so. She personally knew many of the supposedly dead that haunted Wammy's House, claiming them precious in her own life and finding each death a new twist of the knife in her still beating female heart.

It was masochism to tolerate the stories, she knew. There was no good to be had in listening to them, and yet she could not help but be drawn to the places where children claimed to see their ghosts. Where the space between the living and the dead was so thin she could prick it with her thumb nail.

"Hello?" She would whisper into the emptiness before her. Like a sweet embrace, a sensation came over her. A blanket over her shoulders, a secret promise with words she could not understand.

She was not alone. There was a presence around her, but she could only feel it, not see it.

"A… A is that you?" She called him by his letter first for to call by his name was to make it too real. It was to acknowledge that the hanged boy she had so desperately fallen for was still trapped in this wretched place with the noose still wrapped around his neck, and that he was trapped in his suffering. It was a thought she could barely stand. "Please… if that's you, give me something to work with."

The light flickered off, and she was left in the complete darkness. She remained where she was, waiting, hoping for a sign that he was not angry with her for abandoning him that day. The day she finally snapped and fled the house by foot swearing to never return; too many tragedies had happened in such a short time she was too young to understand it.

In the distance she could see it. A vague white blur amongst the night, caught in the moonlight of an open window. She stepped forward, her slippers muting her footsteps as she drifted towards the ghost that so beckoned her forward.

It was only there for an instant, then it was gone. There was the flash of her torch light, and it was in front of her screaming with rotting mouth and rotting eyes, reaching forward with its blackened hands. She pulled away and it vanished before her.

She knew, then, that A had not forgiven her for what she had done. It did not matter that she had returned, she had left him behind and he would never forget those seven long years without company.

She grabbed her torch and fled, leaving her blanket behind.

The next morning, she dared to tread in the space of the former East Wing once more. Her blanket was found folded next to the open window, a withered flower, if it could truly be called that, sat on the top staring at her with all the promises of forgotten years before her.

She picked up the blanket and wept.


	2. Chapter 2

THIRD MIRROR

One should never let the steam build up in the shower as when you finish washing there will be writing on the third mirror from the left regardless of whether there was somebody in the room with you or not.

That was what Y had heard that afternoon as a passing word between two children as she finished her class for the older children: a lesson on the Kira case that had swept the nation some ten years ago. She thought it an oddly specific thing, the third mirror from the left and asked which bathroom it was that you were to never do this in.

"The upstairs one in the South wing." Responded the oldest of the children with far apart eyes and a constant sneer on his face. Despite his appearance, he was the most well-behaved in the class and was always enthusiastic when it came to her lessons. "They say if you stare at the words long enough they'll continue writing in front of you as well."

It was an absurd thing, but Y felt compelled to try it out regardless, so she went to the upstairs bathroom in the South wing where the fourth generation had grown up, and she locked herself in the bathroom. She checked every corner of the tiled space, making sure there was no one in the room with her.

Once she was certain she was alone, she turned on the shower as hot as she was able and stood by the shower staring at the third mirror from the left. She crossed her arms and she waited until she could barely see in front of her before she quickly turned off the shower and marched to the mirror, glaring at its blurred surface.

It was then that she saw it.

Large writing appeared on the surface, written by an invisible hand. She watched an M form, transforming into an A T T.

MATT WAS HERE.

She barely knew Matt, having joined Wammy's House as a member only two years before his closest companion Mello had stormed out. Matt had been a quiet boy devoted to his video games, but it did not stop the ache in her heart when she learned of his death: and such a pointless death it had been he had surrendered and was shot to death. She made sure the police had suffered for that personally.

"Matt…" She called out into the shower room, and for a moment she caught sight of a tall figure in the corner of the mirror. She turned around, but saw nobody there.

She was completely alone.

She had tried it again the next day, once again locking herself in the room and turning on the shower to its full temperature, standing in front of the mirror and watching as it fogged up. She watched her face vanished into a blur of vague colours and, once again, watched as the letters formed on the surface.

IT'S COLD.

She thought it rather warm, and told the ghost as such even though she could not see him.

It was only as the mirror began to clear that she saw an extra hand on her shoulder. She turned once again, startled by the hand. The hand was not on her shoulder, but when she turned back it was brown hair that stood in the mirror, and the face of a boy she had only seen for a short time.

He stared for a moment with a tilted head. Slowly, she reached out with a gloved hand. The mirror shattered before she could touch it.

"Shit!" She cursed, a shard pricking her finger, seeping through the white surface of her glove. She quickly pulled the glove off, shoving it into her skirt pocket. She would have to close off the bathroom until the mirror could be fixed.


	3. Chapter 3

MISSING JAM

There was a general rule about leaving jam in the fridge that you did not. Unless it went in a specific cupboard before a certain time, there was little doubt in anyone's mind that it would soon go missing. At first, Y thought it was because there was another child in the house with a jam addiction, thinking back on her old friend B who had been obsessed with all sorts of jams during his time alive.

However, the further her time went on at Wammy's House, the more confused she became at the location of jams once she had found them. At first, it had started small. They were found half-eaten on tables and chairs, on window sills and other places that were easy for children to reach, and she thought the child had left it behind after having themselves a tasty snack.

As the days went on, and the November stretched into December, the location of the jams became more and more unusual. They would be found in high places that her short figure struggled to reach without a chair, then even stranger places. On the top of the fridge, on top of cupboards, in the linen cupboard on the top shelf.

She thought the child was certainly messing with her to put them in places she could not reach, giggling at the delight of seeing her actually struggle with something, having to ask Esmerelda or, in other circumstances, Roger to help her reach the jam.

Then there were places even children could not scale.

One time she had spotted a jam jar on the top of the light shade in the main hallway, then a rafter in the East Wing glinting down at her.

Half empty jam jars were left in locked rooms that were still locked by the time she had reached them. She had even found them in A's former room, which was certainly locked at all times.

"Just what is going on here?" She would think with crossed arms, growing increasingly puzzled by her experiences.

The only time she had issue with it was when the jam jar was left exposed to the elements and a mould appeared on the surface, or bugs managed to get inside. It was a waste of a perfectly good jar of jam, and there was nothing Y loathed more than wasted food. She would have to scrap the entire thing into the food waste bucket and think to herself that this child was proving increasingly troublesome.

A jam jar stared back at her.

She had just unlocked the door to her bedroom and saw it there by her bed side along with various notes that were covered in sticky red finger prints. She soon saw that the finger prints were too large to be that of a child and read the notes.

She would know that writing from anywhere. The scratchy, barely comprehensible chicken scratch of B's disturbed writing told her enough.

ENJOYING MY GAME?

She was not enjoying it at all. She quickly folded the notes, barely reading them, and tucked them into the drawer next to her bed.

She only turned away for a moment, but by the time she had turned back around the jam jar had vanished.

She found it three days later under her writing chair.


	4. Chapter 4

FIRST PLACE

The look of dread in the eyes of children that ranked first place in tests was something that baffled Y, especially when it came to those who were ranked first place in more than one test. The way they would kick up a fight and beg to be graded down utterly baffled her until she heard the unpleasant rumour that if you ranked 1st place anywhere for a prolonged period of time, or ranked 1st in more than one place, you would wake up covered in scratches and bruises.

She thought it a terribly cruel thing for children to say to each other and immediately scolded anyone that whispered about such rumours at the dinner table, keeping a special eye out for first rankers lest they be attacked when she was out of their view.

And so, it went that she wandered the corridors at night with her torch in hand, barefoot and dressed in night gown with the solitude of the halls being her only company. She would never dare to acknowledge the shadows that stretched out like jagged knives just beyond the torch light, beckoning for her to turn it off and step into their darkness.

She had been tempted once and she was still frightfully shaken by the visage that had appeared before her with its rotten eyes and rotten mouth, the haunted image of A and his crooked neck lurking in the crevices of her mind like a mould that had festered across her skull.

She was treading down a familiar path when she heard screaming loud and clear and for a second, she thought it was A returning from his resting spot in the East Wing to howl at her once more. When no such image came running at her, she soon realised that the scream was too high-pitched and belonged to one of the children and immediately began to search for the source of the screaming.

It was the first ranker in mathematics that week, and the lights were flicked on, the child howling and screaming like there was no tomorrow, and perhaps for him there was no tomorrow. Y immediately set her torch down and knelt down before the child, wrapping her arms around his tiny body as he wept miserably into her embrace.

He wept and wept until his tears became sobs and his sobs turned into hiccups.

"Now why don't you tell me what this is all about?" She thought that perhaps it was a nightmare, as it so often was with children, but instead he showed her his arms and she was stunned by what she saw.

They were entirely covered in scratches, some drawing blood, and the longer she stared the more scratches she saw, layer after layer of scratches just built on top of each other.

"What in the… who did this to you Thomas?"

"N-no-nobody." He stammered out and she was certain that he was covering for the bullies. However, as a new scratch began to draw itself along the arm she began to have her doubts as to whether there was a natural cause for the scratches.

"Come along then, lets get these treated before there's an infection."

She cooled the scratches and cleaned up any blood, patching up the deeper scratches before walking Thomas back to bed. She stayed outside his room for some time, making sure nobody snuck in to cause him trouble, before walking away.

The following week, Amanda was the next top-ranking student in maths and in English and Y followed her like a hound, keeping her secure and, sure she was not attacked, she stood outside her door like a guard the following night.

As was the case with Thomas, once three o'clock struck Amanda began to scream. When Y finally silenced her, she could see the scratches clear as day all over her arms in a criss-crossing manner, stretched up to her elbows. With the culprit nowhere in sight, Y could only clean up the injuries and send Amanda to bed.

It did not stop her from considering the exorcist however.


	5. Chapter 5

THE ATTIC

The attic door was always locked for a good reason. People did not go inside the attic for any purpose, and as a result most of the closets were filled to the brim with extra equipment, the basement consisting of old furniture and abandoned knick knacks that once filled the East Wing.

Y had already taken some of the older furniture and used it for her room on the edge of the Central Wing, two rooms away from the East Wing. An antique chair with a green floral pattern, an oak coffee table, an oak writing desk, a chest of drawers, even a solid trunk used to store various bed cloths and more precious items were all taken from the basement and stored in her room which looked more like it should belong on a period drama than within the 21st century.

Not that she was one to speak. She dressed much like a period piece herself with long skirts and frilled blouses, of vests and dresses meant for Edwardian times she was certain, but it established a character of seriousness, and perhaps delicacy, for her and she was not inclined to change it because it raised a few brows.

She had heard the kitchen staff talking about the attic as she was helping to prepare some spice carrot soup, chopping away in the corner when she overheard Daisy speaking to Holly:

"You know, I've never actually seen that attic being put to use."

"They say a monster lives up there." Daisy scoffed.

"It's no monster, it's just a ghost. That's where the old doctor had his practice, and you know how terrible doctors were back then in mental asylums." She raised her brow at this but said nothing at the time. "A and B used to go up there all the time and look at what happened to them."

"I'm finished with the carrots." Y cut in, disliking people speaking about A and B in front of her. They did not deserve to be part of the rumour train, they had suffered enough during their time alive.

"Thank you, Yoriko, we always appreciate your services." She took off her apron with a smile.

"Always happy to help."

The curiousity did not pass for her, however. A narrow wooden staircase led up to the attic where the door was paler than all other doors in the house. The ring of keys on her hip jangled with each movement, her boots clicking against the steps as she took hold of the door handle.

Naturally, it was locked. She took the keys and tried them, each one that she had not tried before. The keys rattled in the lock but none of them opened it. Until she got to the last one. The lock clicked, and the door creaked open.

The skylights provided a glow to the space in front of her, casting a buttery light in the small, cramp space.

This was A and B's sanctuary, a place where they could be themselves. She was, of course, never invited nor did she ever ask. She never wanted to intrude so it felt personally awkward standing where they once stood then.

She breathed in, the dust following her movement.

There was no furniture to be had, except for a few pillows in the centre alongside some thin sheets of fabric pinned to the low ceiling with a nail. A single unlit candle sat amongst the pillows, various sheets of paper scattered about the enclosed space as she bowed down to get inside, lifting the fabric so she could step into the sacred space.

It was strange being there, like she was intruding on a secret, but her curiousity had gotten the better of her as it so often did. She tucked her skirts underneath her and sat on one of the pillows, gently picking up the pieces of paper trying to decipher their codes.

Tiy lew bir qwkxinw gwew.

She recognised the code, knowing it for being the very code she had created at fourteen to pass messages between the three of them in class. One letter left on the computer keyboard, she had no such keyboard on her just then, and it had been so long since she had used the code she could no longer recall what letter meant what on her own.

The answer came with a slammed door. She jumped, and stood up, knocking her head on the ceiling as she saw that the door was now shut. She immediately went to it, trying to ram it open. It remained firmly in place, as though it were nothing more than a fixture on the wall.

Then she heard scribbling and when she turned around she saw that the candle had been lit and that words were appearing on the pieces of paper.

Tiy agiyks bir glcw xinw gwew

Tiy le wub slbfwe

Rgua ua iye aolxw fwr iyr

She tried the door once more, shaking it violently, curse her compulsive need to investigate.

The door finally caved, and she stumbled down the stairs, the door slamming shut behind her, the lock clicking in place.

Y stood there for some time, trying to regulate her breathing. Eventually, she returned up the stairs to try to open the door once again but found that it was locked once more. She went to grab her key, but it was no longer on the ring.

She would not enter the attic ever again.


	6. Chapter 6

BUILDING THIRTEEN

Y was well aware of the fact that the complex of former hospital buildings that surrounded Wammy's House were often used by the children as part of an initiation process, having been a victim of such a process herself before she became vengeful and destroyed the club from the inside out.

The thirteenth building was called Forsyth and was a four-storey granite rectangle that was surrounded by a garden of long grass and weeds, an abandoned swing set creaking gently in the wind of that late evening as she trudged through the wild towards the steps which brought her to the great front entrance of carved faces and the date the former children's hospital was opened: 1889.

Y was looking for children that were treading in the dangerous buildings as part of an initiation process, or perhaps as part of their own obscure little cults, when she stepped into the open space. Almost all of the furniture had been stripped away from the building, but she could see that the cubby holes were still in use; small shoes tucked into the spaces which told her others were there.

It was a general rule that one did not wear shoes in the hospital lest you offend one of the former doctors, but with broken glass on the ground Y was not so inclined to take her shoes off. Glass crunched underneath her as she wandered past the entrance hall, past the benches and the reception area to the large stone staircase behind the entrance.

She listened closely for the sounds of children as she walked alone, her footsteps echoing in corridors as the moon illuminated the space for her, streaks of light against a navy backdrop. She could hear children giggling and, turning her light on, made to march down the corridor to investigate.

The air before her was icy, visible to her where before it was unnaturally warm for winter weather. She breathed into her gloved hands, rubbing them warm as a terrible cold took hold of her; she was only grateful she was dressed appropriately for the December night.

There was a noise and she lifted her torch up.

A bright red ball stood in the centre of the corridor. Slowly, it began to roll towards her. She did not move until it hit her toe, and even then, she hesitated in picking it up.

She drew away sharply when she saw a child's hand reach out for it. The ball was pulled away from her and there stood a small child that she had never seen before; and she knew all of the children at Wammy's House. Her first instinct was to run, but she was somehow locked in place.

Then, the child spoke.

"She's in the thirteenth room." And with that the child vanished before her very eyes.

She did not move for some time, left alone in the darkened corridor certain that she had just experienced the most disturbing hallucination, if that was what it was, in her life time. With a gulp, she continued down the corridor to the thirteenth room.

It was there that she found Amanda curled up on herself sobbing out her gentle heart; her body a convulsion of terribly shivers. Y immediately took off her coat and wrapped it around the crying girl.

"Come on, you're getting out of here. And you're telling me who did this to you."

She left no room for excuses and three days later there stood three girls in Roger's office receiving a very firm talking to, and their rooms were locked at night as punishment for poor behaviour.

It did not stop things from getting into their rooms and tormenting them. Y only knew it through their screaming, and was certain it was the haunted beasts from the hospital that had hunted them down. After hearing their wails for too long the doors were left unlocked.

Since that day, very few children went into the children's hospital on the Wammy's House property. Even she would avoid it when possible, seeing the figure of a child waving down at her from the floors above where nobody could access.

If she stared long enough she could see the child holding a red ball.

And missing half his skull.


	7. Chapter 7

To whom it may concern, I would like to inform you that I am writing a chronological story based upon the ideas I have included in this story, and that is the reason I have chosen to update this despite the changes involved. This story will be published up to chapter four immediately after this story. I hope you shall read it and I hope it is enjoyable. This may be used in the future for abandoned scenes. Until then... enjoy this short chapter.

* * *

PUMPKIN SPICE

Y had a twitch where she never felt particularly comfortable unless there was a large quantity of food within the House and would constantly find herself stocking up the pantry when she wandered into town for fear of there not being enough food if the road flooded.

It was no fault of the House that she had such a twitch, for it was something that had merely followed her from her home. A childhood of constant hunger pangs, of rummaging through the woods and fighting with other wildlife for the chance of a meal whether it be the raw remains of a deer or something else entirely.

It was worse during the latter half of the month for that was when food in the wilds was even lesser than it had been during the summer. Even when raised at the House she would hide food under her bed and would never eat the food that was made for her. Another twitch of hers; if she did not see who made it, how they made it, or where the products came from, she simply would not touch it. Even if another child gave it to her she would not touch it, although she learned through time how to conceal such a fact from the public. Many plants had been watered with tea, and if they were lacking nutrition before, the food buried in their soil made sure there was more than enough.

It was late October, and Halloween was not far away. She had ordered an absurd amount of pumpkins, as was the tradition of the household, and found herself carving up the pumpkins when she was not working; often at hours where most would be asleep. Insomnia was a curse but could be a blessing in some settings if not for the constant creak of the building that unsettled newer workers.

She always was an artist with a knife, better than most and with even more skill than those that used it for its truly carnal purpose. Not that she was any better, but she did not do it with the same twisted pleasure others did.

The hollow eyes of the pumpkin stared back at her, the dark orange of its insides almost black. She could see how such things could unsettle in true darkness if they were not associated with such an excitable time of year for children. If one saw a pumpkin drifting in the woods, they would flee from habit, and she thought with certainty hers would do well with terrorising.

"You shall do well, Jacob." She confirmed with a nod as she washed her hands, drying them before searching for the large jar of pumpkin spice in the main pantry.

Most of the spices were kept at the top as some of the older children would trick the younger children into eating a spoonful of whatever spice they chose; often with unpleasant consequences. She had to get a step ladder to get to the appropriate shelf, pulling out the pumpkin spice.

She had only been doing it for a short while, but she had learned that rubbing the spices along the inside of the pumpkin would lead to a pleasant smile once a candle was put inside. Pushing the step ladder back in place, she returned to the kitchen with a slight skip in her step.

The candle had been placed inside the pumpkin and was lit. It had caught her by surprise for there was no candle in the kitchen beforehand; all of the candles had been put in the store room in case the power went out once again.

'I did not hear anyone come in…' And Y took great pride in her exceptionally good hearing. She stilled, her own breathing muted, as she listened out for the sounds of ruffled clothes, of breathing or even of steps.

All she got was the groan of the floorboards above.

She set the jar down and lifted the pumpkin. As she often did, she carved the pumpkin from the bottom rather than the top, which allowed easy access to the steady flow of the candle which popped when she removed the pumpkin.

"Sorry, Jacob, a touch too early to dress up. Perhaps tomorrow." She blew out the candle.


End file.
